


The Peace of Wild Things

by Paper_Crane_Song



Category: The Man From U.N.C.L.E. (TV)
Genre: Friendship, Gen, Hurt/Comfort, Sleep Deprivation
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-10-10
Updated: 2016-10-10
Packaged: 2018-08-20 14:14:59
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,974
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8252105
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Paper_Crane_Song/pseuds/Paper_Crane_Song
Summary: Thanks to Thrush's latest innovation, Illya has been awake for days and cannot fall asleep. Napoleon's rescue attempt will not be as straightforward as he first thought.





	

**Author's Note:**

> I got the idea for this story from another Uncle fic - one of those short "Five times" stories where Illya is recovering in hospital, unable to sleep in the wake of an electric shock machine, and so Napoleon climbs into bed next to him to help him sleep. It was a while ago when I read it, so unfortunately I can't remember the name of the fic or the author to give them credit. Suffice to say, it was a great idea, and I've just fleshed it out a bit. I'd love to hear what you think.
> 
> The title is from the poem 'The Peace of Wild Things' by Wendell Berry.

His partner was strapped into place and held upright, electrodes at his temples wiring him to a machine.

“Illya,” he said softly, urgently, placing a hand on his shoulder.

Illya raised his head. His eyes were burning, deep wells in an ashen face.

They stared at each other, then Illya's gaze flicked to the bodies of the Thrush operatives and the spell was broken.

“Time to go, partner,” Napoleon said, striving for a light tone as he gently disconnected him from wires, “we outstayed our welcome long ago.” He undid the straps over his legs, then released his arms. He removed the chest strap last, and Illya slumped forward. Napoleon caught him, lowered him down to the floor, propped him up against the work unit.

“Did they drug you?”

To his surprise, Illya shook his head.

“No drugs,” he replied thickly, “just, no sleep.”

Napoleon had planned for them to escape the castle under the cover of darkness, but everything about Illya was too bright; his shirt, his hair - still bleached white by a Congolese sun on their last mission. He looked about him and saw a dark fleece slung over a chair. He snagged it and started manhandling Illya into it. “How many days?”

Illya tried to help but his movements were disconnected, disjointed, and he was taking too long to answer each question. Napoleon got the impression that Illya was thinking in Russian first and then translating each word into English.

“When is today?” Illya said eventually.

“Thursday.” He batted Illya's hands away from the zip and did it up for him, then pulled off his own black hat and tugged it over his partner's head. He sat back on his heels, surveying him. Nearly camouflaged, yet Illya's face was still a problem; his skin gave off an almost skeletal glow. Keeping one eye on the door, Napoleon spat on his palms and then rubbed them over his own face, dirtying them with the camouflage paint. Then he smeared his hands over Illya's face, feeling him flinch under his touch. _Cold_ _skin, sandpaper stubble._ It was too rough to be a caress, and he was done before Illya could protest.

“It's night time,” Illya surmised. Napoleon nodded, relieved that Illya's mind was still sharp. Then Illya said, “Five days.”

“What?” he said, suddenly distracted. Was that a door he heard? The sound of footsteps, running?

“Since I slept.”

Regret and guilt surged over him like waves – _I'm sorry – the handover went wrong – you were lost – Waverly and I, we argued –_ but he pushed them away. There was no time to say those things, and Illya didn't need to hear them anyway.

Instead, he hauled his partner to his feet and thrust a gun into his hands. “Watch my back.”

He was halfway to the door when Illya said, “Wait.”

He turned, fighting the urge to shout at him to get moving.

“The papers,” said Illya, swaying where he stood. “They are inside the desk.”

“Papers?”

“The papers...Схема.”

 Napoleon racked his brain for the translation even as he raced to the desk. Схема…. “Schematics? Schematics for what?” 

But Illya didn't answer him, and so Napoleon opened each drawer in turn, starting from the bottom, stuffing whatever papers he could find into his rucksack.

 “Okay,” he said, straightening up, “let's go.” 

 At that moment a siren split the air, the shrill pitch making the fillings in his teeth hurt. “Come on!” he shouted over the noise.

Gunfire - the rush of feet - their escape route cut off. They were driven to the roof of the castle, a black expanse below them.

“There's a moat,” Napoleon whispered. His fingers were gripping Illya's arm, and he could feel him trembling, from adrenaline or exhaustion or a combination of both.

The stairway lit up behind them, and so he tightened his grip and together they leapt out into the darkness.

 

* * *

 

The water hits Napoleon like a slab of concrete and Illya is pulled from his grasp. Too soon his legs strike the floor of the moat, sending shooting pains up through his spine, and he surfaces, dark spots at the corner of his vision. He can move his legs though, and his arms, and so he ignores the pain and looks about him for his partner.

A fair head surfaces next to him, reflecting moonlight. Illya meets his eyes, more alert now, and nods, flashing him one of his rare smiles. The water is cold, and they strike out for the bank, away from the lights of the castle. Now there are the sound of motors, dogs barking, and they crawl through weeds and rushes, Illya pulling the hood of the fleece over his head to make up for the lost hat. It is enough; they are undetected, and now they are running, running through the countryside, away from the shouts and the activity.

Too soon though, they are in trouble. Napoleon's back jars him with every step, and it is apparent that Illya's burst of adrenaline is wearing off; he is stumbling even with Napoleon's hand to stabilise him.

Napoleon sees a silhouette ahead, a building possibly, and he steers them towards it. His wet clothes are weighing him down, but luckily the night is warm. At one point, Illya speaks to him in Russian and tells him that they need to go back to get the schematics.

“I have them already, you saw me,” Napoleon answers him, the rusty words sounding too loud in the stillness of the dark landscape.

Another time Illya might have shot him a look – _Napoleon, your accent is horrible, not to mention your grammar_ – but now, all Illya seems to be concentrating on is staying upright.

The silhouette takes on the form of a ruined barn. Moss has grown amongst the stonework, the roof has caved in and there is the lingering smell of manure and straw.

“We'll stay here for a half hour,” says Napoleon, carefully lowering himself to the floor in an effort not to hurt his back any more. Illya slumps down in a heap next to him.

He rummages in his rucksack and finds a granola bar. He elbows Illya to get his attention, hands it to him. Illya tears into it with gusto whilst Napoleon continues to look in the rucksack for the water bottle and painkillers.

“They feed you at all?” he says, downing the painkillers. With Illya, it is hard to tell; he attacks food in the same manner no matter if he has eaten a few hours ago, or a few days ago.

Illya mumbles an affirmative, his mouth full.

He leans back against the cold stone wall. “Well, that's something.”

Around them the air is silent, with none of the usual wildlife sounds he would expect to hear. Is Thrush nearby?

He feels Illya take the water bottle from his hands, hears him gulp the liquid down. Napoleon arranges himself uncomfortably against the stone wall, trying to find a position that doesn't hurt.

“You okay?” Illya says, his accent thicker than usual.

“I'm fine,” he says, waving the question away. “Get some sleep.” He shifts again, and his back twinges in protest. “But don't go pulling a Rip van Winkle on me.”

“He a relative of yours?” he hears Illya say drowsily.

“You know, the gaps in your cultural education astonish me sometimes." He feels Illya shrug his shoulders next to him, and he smiles to himself.

They sit like that, side by side. Napoleon is alert, his senses heightened, but that gnawing anxiety that has been tearing at him this past week has gone now.

And then suddenly Illya jerks forward. Napoleon is on his feet at once, gun out, scanning the area rapidly, trying to see everything all at the same time. His first thought is that Illya has been shot. But he cannot see any Thrush operatives, and there was no sound of a pistol.

Illya is breathing harshly, and Napoleon kneels down in front of him. “Illya? What happened?” He can hear his own blood pounding in his ears.

“Nothing,” Illya gasps out. “Stupid… I fell asleep.”

Suddenly it all clicks together. “That machine you were hooked up to?”

He feels the movement of Illya nodding, hair ghosting his face. “Electric shocks,” he says, each word too slow, too careful. “It was... quite effective. We should recommend it to Mr. Waverly.”

Napoleon snorts, and arranges himself back against the wall. “Be my guest. Though somehow I don't think sleep deprivation is quite UNCLE's style.”

But despite his partner's light-hearted tone, he can hear the exhaustion underneath.

The second time Illya bolts upright, Napoleon lays a tentative hand on his shoulder. Illya shakes it off and turns away from him, collecting himself, and now Napoleon is beginning to worry. Illya needs to sleep. He needs Illya to sleep. Thrush will be looking for them, and there's no way Illya can get far in that state, and Napoleon's back injury means that he will not be able to carry him.

So to hell with Illya's pride. "Look at me, Illya. _Look at me_."

Illya turns back slowly, drooping, his eyes glittering and unfocused. He looks so tired.

 “You're free now," Napoleon says, attempting to break through the conditioning. "You're not hooked up to that machine. There are no more electric shocks. Say it. Say it, Illya.”

“I'm free now,” Illya repeats, slurring his words now in tiredness, “there is no machine. No electricity.”

“Atta boy,” Napoleon says softly, patting his cheek. “Sweet dreams, Illya.”

They settle down again, and the night is still too quiet, and Napoleon leans his head back against the stones and tries to ignore the pain at the base of his spine, and after a few minutes he dares to hope that his partner might actually have fallen asleep, and he allows himself to relax, and then Illya breaks the night with a cry as he slams forward.

Napoleon starts, his heartrate spiking, but before he can reach out to him Illya is on his knees, his head touching the ground as if in supplication, and he is swearing in Russian, and there is desperation in his voice as he clutches the soil, pressing himself into the earth, and suddenly Napoleon realises what he needs, and then it is instinct, like breathing.

 

* * *

 

Illya can feel the wet of the earth underneath his fingers and smell the petrichor of the soil but he cannot seem to make himself believe that he is not in that machine anymore, and it is so cruel and he is so tired and _dear God please_ -

and then there are strong arms around him, holding him from behind, a heavy weight on his back, and his muscles tense even as Napoleon draws him backwards, backwards, and in his disorientation he sees the moon swimming below him in a lake of tears and then his head is on Napoleon's breast and Napoleon's arms are around him, and he is being held more closely and more fiercely than anyone has ever held him, and there is a flash of fear, and then he hears Napoleon whisper in his ear, “I've got you, Illya, you can sleep,” over and over, as if the very intensity of his voice and the strength of his embrace can force Illya's subconscious to forget the conditioned response of the shocks, and he can hear the _thud_ _thud_ of Napoleon's heartbeat and feel the dampness of Napoleon's jacket and smell the stagnant water and underneath that there is Napoleon himself, and he knows now in a way that he has barely grasped before that there is _nothing_ his partner would not do for him, and the knowledge warms him even as his body is becoming weightless, like air, and he closes his eyes and melts into the stars -

 

_Finis_


End file.
